Reichsbank (Siegen)

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Facade on Spandauer Strasse, view from the north

The building of the former Reichsbank -stelle Siegen was built in 1909–1911 for the branch of the German Reichsbank in the city of Siegen and is a listed building . In August 2010 the building was named Monument of the Month by the NRW Historical City Center .

The bank building was erected on the property at Wilhelmstrasse 10a acquired by the Reichsbank for 66,063.81 Marks ; since the street was renamed, it has had the address Spandauer Strasse 40 . The location on a main road near the center of the city expresses (as in other cities) the great importance of a Reichsbank branch for the economic life of the city and its surrounding area. After 1945 the building was used as the successor to the Reichsbank by the North Rhine-Westphalian state central bank , later it was sold and served as the administration building of the Utsch company .

history

For its nationwide branch network, the Reichsbank, founded on January 1, 1876, initially used, in addition to the branches taken over by the Prussian Bank , often existing, only rented buildings, but soon developed a brisk construction activity, for which the central Reichsbank construction office in Berlin was responsible. For the three-level hierarchy of the branches (“main office” - “office” - “subsidiary”), room plans, cost frameworks and other principles were defined, not only for the new buildings planned by the Reichsbank construction office and carried out under the authority of the Reichsbank, but also for individual buildings Buildings designed by other architects or built by cities interested in having their “own” branch were the basis. This resulted in a basic comparability of the buildings, sometimes even a clear similarity in the architectural design.

In Siegen, the Reichsbank built the new building for its branch, which had existed since 1876, itself; the design came from the Reichsbank construction office. The head of the construction office, the architect and construction officer Julius Habicht is to be regarded as the draftsman , the local construction management was carried out by the architect Neumann . Construction began in November 1909 and was completed on November 20, 1911. The costs for the demolition of the existing building on the property and the new construction amounted to around 380,000 marks.

architecture

Among the Reichsbank buildings of this time and of this size, the design of the building can be compared particularly well with the branches built in Katowice in Upper Silesia and in Elbing in West Prussia : All three are eaves and have three full floors, their main façades with colossal order are seven window axes wide, above the in the middle five (three in Elbing) axes sits a triangular gable with a semicircular or oval window in front of a high hipped roof .

The façade of the mezzanine floor (with the former ticket hall inside) is rusticated above the base, which is now painted dark . The first and second floors have a plastered facade with a colossal structure through flat pilaster strips and recesses. Ornamental gemstones sit on the second floor in the coffered parapet fields and the semicircular fields above the lintels. The hipped roof and triangular gable rise above a strong main cornice , which is continued in the gable cornice. Stylistically, this architecture can be classified in neoclassicism , triangular gables and pilaster strips suggest a temple front typical of classical antiquity .

Changes

During the Second World War , the house suffered minor damage from incendiary bombs, only the rear wing of the building was destroyed. The reconstruction in 1949 and 1950 cost 52,380 DM . While the main facade of the building has only changed slightly (dark paint on the base and the gemstones, two additional small windows in the gable field), the interior of the building has been renovated several times and adapted to the changed use and the changing taste of the time. The original, standardized room plan also included a representative apartment for the branch manager on the second floor, which was presumably converted into office space before the Second World War.

literature

  • Margit Heinker: The architecture of the German Reichsbank 1876–1918. (Dissertation, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, 1994.) Self-published, Münster / Altenberge 1998, ISBN 3-00-003732-2 , pp. 149–151 (as well as construction data in the non- paginated part of the catalog and illustrations 221–224).
  • Striking “temple facade”. In: Siegener Zeitung of August 21, 2010.

Web links

Coordinates: 50 ° 52 ′ 16.1 "  N , 8 ° 1 ′ 15"  E